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The long-awaited second edition of an important textbook on economic growth—a major revision incorporating the most recent work on the subject.

This graduate level text on economic growth surveys neoclassical and more recent growth theories, stressing their empirical implications and the relation of theory to data and evidence. The authors have undertaken a major revision for the long-awaited second edition of this widely used text, the first modern textbook devoted to growth theory. The book has been expanded in many areas and incorporates the latest research. After an introductory discussion of economic growth, the book examines neoclassical growth theories, from Solow-Swan in the 1950s and Cass-Koopmans in the 1960s to more recent refinements; this is followed by a discussion of extensions to the model, with expanded treatment in this edition of heterogenity of households. The book then turns to endogenous growth theory, discussing, among other topics, models of endogenous technological progress (with an expanded discussion in this edition of the role of outside competition in the growth process), technological diffusion, and an endogenous determination of labor supply and population. The authors then explain the essentials of growth accounting and apply this framework to endogenous growth models. The final chapters cover empirical analysis of regions and empirical evidence on economic growth for a broad panel of countries from 1960 to 2000. The updated treatment of cross-country growth regressions for this edition uses the new Summers-Heston data set on world income distribution compiled through 2000.

Why do economies grow? What fixes the long-run rate of growth? These are some of the simplest, but also hardest, questions in economics. Growth of lack of it has huge consequences for a country's citizens. But for various reasons, growth theory has had long fallow patches. Happily, this is changing.

In 1956 Robert Solow developed what became the standard neo-classical model of economic growth. Counties grow, on this theory, by accumulating labour and capital. Adding either obeys diminishing returns: the more labour or capital you already have, the more you need for a further given jump in output. One consequence is that an economy with less capital ought to outgrow one with more. Generally, they do. Another is that growth should eventually drop to zero. Awkwardly, it stays positive. To save the theory, long-run growth was explained by an outside factor, technical innovation, which is not in the growth function itself—hence the label "exogenous" for the Solow family of models. Partial as it was, the Solow model won wide acceptance and growth theory slumbered for three decades. Then came two changes. One was an attempt to add technical change and other factors to labour and capital within the growth function so that the model might predict long-run growth without leaning on outside "residuals"—the so-called "endogenous" approach. The other was a huge number of factual studies.

Barro and Sala-i-Martin explain all this and more with admirable clarity (and much demanding maths) in the first modern textbook devoted to growth theory. The main theories are examined. The stress throughout is on linking theory to fact. One of three chapters on empirical work suggests how much each of several possible factors would be needed to explain differing international growth rate—not an explanation itself, but an indispensable set of empirical benchmarks. From The Economist, 17 February 1996

Contributor

Leading economists analyze the multiple factors that drive competitiveness among nations in world markets.

Competitiveness among nations is often approached as if it were a sports competition: some countries win medals, others lose out. This view of countries fighting it out in the economic arena is especially popular in business circles and among politicians. Economists, however, take a very different approach to international economic relations, arguing that international trade leads not to winners and losers but to win-win situations in which all countries profit. In this volume, leading economists take on the sometimes-derided concept of competitiveness, demonstrating the value of systematic analysis in an area too often dominated by special interest groups who use (and abuse) the concept to advance hidden agendas. The chapters range from broad theoretical views to case studies, examining the multiple factors that drive competitiveness. Contributors consider the conceptual framework underlying the World Economic Forum's approach to competitiveness; differences in per capita GDP between the United States and the European Union; an integrated approach to measuring competitiveness and comparative advantage; divergent trends in price and cost competitiveness in the euro area; methodological issues in constructing competitiveness indicators; taxation and international competitiveness; and a case study of Mexico's competitiveness in world markets in comparison to China's.